The Street Rat and The Bourgeois Boy
by FeminerdyPotato
Summary: No one remembers the street rat and the bourgeois boy, the ones who died right next to each other in the floor of the Cafe Musain. Their stories died with them. Trigger Warning: Character Death.


**It's me again! Allright, let's cut to the chase:**

**I own nothing.**

**Reviews appreciated almost as much as Les Mis itself.**

**Trigger Warning: Death.**

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His speeches, the fiery passion in his eyes as he spoke, all awkwardness gone when the topic he loved most came around, all of these had attracted me to him.  
And where had that got me? Certain death.  
I had known this was going to happen from day one. Unlike the others, I had been unable to believe in this revolution. I'd never been one for false hope. He wasn't about to listen to me, I knew, and I didn't push it. I knew where I stood.  
I was just a little girl to him, just mildly interested. He didn't recognize me when I arrived outside the Musain dressed in a boy's clothes.  
Years of starvation had caused me to be smaller than most, my hair too short to do much with. In the end, I'd just piled it on my head and tied it with string before hiding it under a cap, preying none of them would notice.  
His blue eyes were inches from mine, his mouth forming one word. _Jump._  
I shook my head. _No_. My refusal signed my own fate, sealing it and hiding it where it couldn't be changed.  
_This is not your cross to bear._ He was always the type to take none of the blame, especially when there was a girl around.  
_I joined you, didn't_ _I?_ It didn't matter what he said. My fate was sealed, imprinted on the wooden floorboards I was standing on.  
_Does it matter?_ Silly, naive him, always thinking this would work out in the end.  
_It's as much my fight as it is yours._ I tilted my head back, causing my hair to spill out from under my cap and about my chin, a brown waterfall of knots.  
He just nodded at me. I knew from hour one.  
We turned to face the guns together, the world exploding into gunfire.  
He took the brunt of the shots, eight bloody wounds sealing everything. Nothing vital, although he would be dead soon. Too much bloodloss for a chance of survival.  
I wasn't so lucky. One had grazed the side of my chest, the other burying itself in my shoulder. I'd die around the same time he did.  
"I should have pushed you." I don't know how he still managed to speak.  
"It's not your fault, kid." I shrugged my good shoulder, ignoring the pain the simple movement brings on.  
"Is too. I was your leader, I led you guys to certain death." The shame in his eyes is an expression I will never get over.  
"You didn't! You gave us the opportunity to leave long ago. I remember the words you said. 'Let us not waste lives. If you don't believe, then exit this cafe and don't look back. I have no time for your 'fun and games' when half of this nation is suffering.' None of us left." I shake my head as vigorously as possible with a bullet wound, somehow maneuvering him to where he can lay his head on my shoulder.  
"You should've. You never believed."  
"I believed. Not in the cause, but in you. I believed in your fancy speeches, your dancing eyes, your passion. I believed in you."  
"I don't understand why. You knew I was leading you to certain death." The wails of those dying in the streets worsen, rising in pitch and causing pain to flicker across his face before returning to the marble facade I'd once known before he opened to me.  
"I stayed because if you would die, I'd die alongside you. Even if you were dying for a hopeless cause."  
"'Ponine-"  
"Don't talk that way, Enj." He just sighs as I press my lips to the worst wound he got, a large bullet hole in his shoulder. His breaths are getting shakier, bloodloss getting to him at last.  
I reach for his gun, pressing it to the same bullet wound in my shoulder, one that is less bloody than his. This will fix that.  
"Ponine-"  
"This is what I want, Enj. My family doesn't care and Gavroche is out there dying with the rest of them. Do you think I care about this place any longer? No one cares about this street rat." I know immediately that my words are too harsh for him, but the truth is best.  
I fire into the same wound as last time, crying out again as more pain rips thru my shoulder. My head lolls back against the windowsill, more blood soaking my front slowly.  
The sticky air attracts flies that feed on our wounds, but we're beyond caring. Instead we lay there together, my head on his chest that is unmarred by bullets, his hand on my back.  
Each breath we take is fought for, but I don't know why. There is nothing for us here.  
I finally release my last breath, the feeling of being empty swarming over me as I die to the cries of the wounded outside.  
No one remembers the street rat and the bourgeois boy, the ones who died right next to each other in the floor of the Cafe Musain. Their stories died with them.


End file.
